Water elephant
|Reported = 1907(sighting) 1912 (publication)|Researchers = Bernard Heuvelmans Matt Salusbury}} The water elephant or ndgoko na maiji (Teke: "water elephant" ) is a cryptid proboscidean reported from the 's Bandundu Province, known mainly from two sightings in 1907. Shuker, Karl P. N. ShukerNature: WHITHER THE WATER ELEPHANT? karlshuker.blogspot.com 10 April 2019 It is distinct from the pygmy elephant, and has been connected with the Rothschild tusk, the lake elephant, and water lions. Description Le Petit described the water elephants seen by him as being 6' to 8' at the shoulder, with relatively short legs, and curved or humped backs, as in the African elephant. Thier necks were about twice the length of those of African elephants, and their ears, though similar in shape to an African elephant's, were "relatively smaller". Their heads were described as being "most distinctly long and ovoid in form", reminding Le Petit of an enormous tapir, and the trunks were only about 2' long. None of the animals showed any trace of having tusks. The skin was hairless, smooth, and shiny, resembling that of a hippopotamus, but darker. Le Petit did not observe if the animals had tails or not. .]] Le Petit saw the tracks of the water elephant on level ground, and described them as having four distinctly seperate toes, as in the hippopotamus. However, the weight of the body was apparently carried by the toes, since their impressions were deep, whilst the impression of the sole was not very pronounced. According to the natives with him, the water elephant is nocturnal and spends its time in water like a hippopotamus, usually only coming out of the water to feed on grasses at sundown. It was also greatly feared by them due to its habit of unexpectedly rising the surface and capsizing their canoes with its short trunk. According to them, it had a restricted range and was uncommon even in 1907. Sightings Undated Hans Schomburgk was shown a piece of thick skin, like that of an elephant but covered in thick reddish hair, by a settler near Lefini. It supposedly came from an aquatic "river elephant" which lived in Lake Mai-Ndombe, which is where the water elephant was reported from, and Philippe Coudray suggests that the skin did in fact come from a water elephant. However, Le Petit described the animals he saw as having hairless, smooth skin like a hippopotamus. Bernard Heuvelmans believed the skin came from a pygmy elephant. 1907 The water elephant was first reported by a traveller named Le Petit in 1912, who spent five years travelling in the Congo. In an article of the East Africa and Uganda Natural History Society, R. J. Cuninghame reported that Le Petit had had two encounters with this animal. His first sighting occured in about June 1907, near the junction of the River Kasai with the River Congo: The second sighting occured later, in the swampy land region between Lake Mai-Ndombe and Lake Tumba. This time, Le Petit got a good look at the animals on land: The last time he saw the herd of five, they disappeared into deep water. circa 2002 In July 2002, cryptozoologist Bill Gibbons reported that the president and CEO of a Belgian helicopter company operating in the Democratic Republic of the Congo claimed that a military helicopter flying over Lake Tumba had seen a herd of "very strange-looking elephants that the helicopter's pilots thought may be the legendary water elephants". Gibbons planned on visiting the lake with the helicopter company to investigate, and a French documentary producer was keen to film the expedition, but the investigation never materialised. Theories Primitive proboscidean Almost everything about the water elephant - its ovoid head, short trunk and legs, and aquatic habits - is extremely reminiscent of a prehistoric, Eocene or Oligocene probiscidean such as Moeritherium or Phiomia. These are known to have lived in Africa, and Moeritherium is believed to have been a semiaquatic, swamp-dwelling animal because of the hippopotamus-like positioning of its eyes, and the nature of its teeth. Karl Shuker notes that, if an animal like Moeritherium survived and became larger, it would eventually give rise to an animal very much like the water elephant. Other than its larger size, the only real discrepancy between the water elephant and something like Moeritherium is that the early probiscideans already had short, primitive tusks. The water elephant has also been likened to the deinotheres, which also lived in Africa, were larger, and are believed to have gone extinct much more recently. However, deinotheres also had long limbs and "downward-curving lower jaws'' bearing a pair of long recurved tusks''", so they would have bore little resemblance to the water elephant. Unknown elephant species Cryptozoologist Matt Salusbury speculated that the water elephant could be an aquatic descendant of the African elephant. In this theory, environmental crises within the past century or so would lead to an isolated population of elephants in the region very rapidly adapting to a nocturnal, aquatic existence.Salusbury, Matt (2013) Pygmy Elephants However, as noted by Shuker, the differences between the water elephant and the African elephant are probably too great to have arisen in such a short timeframe. Notes and references Do you think the exists? If so, what do you think the is? Myth, folklore, hoax, or otherwise made-up Living primitive probiscidean Unknown elephant Category:Cryptids Category:Africa Category:Democratic Republic of the Congo Category:River & lake monsters of the Congo system Category:Proboscideans Category:Theory: New proboscidean species Category:Theory: Living fossil - Prehistoric proboscidean Category:Featured Category:1907 Category:2002 Category:21st Century